


in the end, we're just kids

by ancientgarbage



Category: Homestuck
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, Bullying, Cronus and Karkat are transboys, Dave too, Drug Use, Hospitals, Implied/Referenced Self-Harm, Kurloz briefly mentioned, M/M, a little bit, lots of smoking, oop i almost forgot
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-05-08
Updated: 2015-05-08
Packaged: 2018-03-29 13:22:47
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,793
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3897901
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ancientgarbage/pseuds/ancientgarbage
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Kankri talks, impassioned words with fiery eyes but an empty heart. They don’t listen to him. They scoff and roll their eyes and tell him to shut up. They call him names and shove him to the side in the hallways. Slam him into lockers and tug at his sweater and poke at him even though he tells them not to touch him. They touch him most on the days he’s especially despising physical contact. They leer at him when he walks home, down downtown where the street lights flicker and he even feels the homeless people boring holes into his back.</p><p>They hate him.</p><p>But they all hate the new boy, Cronus, too.</p>
            </blockquote>





	in the end, we're just kids

Kankri talks, impassioned words with fiery eyes but an empty heart. They don’t listen to him. They scoff and roll their eyes and tell him to shut up. They call him names and shove him to the side in the hallways. Slam him into lockers and tug at his sweater and poke at him even though he tells them not to touch him. They touch him most on the days he’s especially despising physical contact. They leer at him when he walks home, down downtown where the street lights flicker and he even feels the homeless people boring holes into his back.

They throw things at him when he goes to the hospital with his father.

They laugh when he comes to school wide eyed, dark circled, and shaking because something went wrong, terribly wrong, and he tries to explain how he needs to be alone, how he’d be happy to explain to them how utterly wrong they are later, but right now he needs to be alone, please go away --

He hates them all. Especially the loud girl with the long dark brown braids and fuchsia glasses.

* * *

There’s a new boy. His name is Cronus Ampora and he’s transferred from some private rich school in the next town over and Kankri scribbles in his notebook, a reminder to try to listen in on his conversations later so he can gauge what type of person he is. He doesn’t want to judge the entire upper class, even if the rich kids in his school are his least favorite.

(they spend all their money on useless trinkets when they could be donating to those less fortunate, and he’s not looking for handouts, oh no, he’s just _saying_ it’d be really nice, you know? if some people didn’t have to worry about where their next meal is coming from, if they’re going to end up on the streets, or any number of very serious problems)

Cronus has slicked back curly black hair and violet eyes. He’s got freckles that rival Kankri’s and really pale skin and he smells faintly of cigarettes and the ocean. He talks in an accent Kankri’s pretty sure he’s heard from some old movie a while ago but no one seems to like him much. His features are a little feminine and he’s a little soft, has a good four inches on him. He tries too hard to make friends and Kankri knows that never works, it makes a person more of a target, actually, so he just lingers nearby and eats his lunch and takes his notes and decides he’s going to approach Cronus later and teach him the err of his ways.

(he’s heard Cronus whispering to himself when something doesn’t go his way, bad things and worrying things, violent things, towards them and towards himself and Kankri isn’t sure what to make of it, but at the very least he can correct him on his rather offensive views)

* * *

It’s funny how things take a completely different turn than what you expect.

He doesn’t understand why he tries to educate Meenah anymore. She’s so cruel, with her hateful fuchsia eyes and her sneers and jabs and _terrible terrible insults that cut down deep and her insinuations that she’s going to take his cousin away and if not her then illness will and FUCK_ he hates her a lot. And yet here he is, arms crossed over his chest, telling her about the responsibility she has, as a member of the upper class, to help those less fortunate because she has more than enough means being the richest family on this side of the country, and she’s grumbling under her breath about something ( _annoying, insufferable_ ) and he just wishes she’d listen for once in her life because this is important, really important. But then the front of his sweater is being grabbed and he’s shoved none-too-gently into his own locker. He peers out through the slits, eyes wide, brown fists banging on the metal, demanding to be let out. Meenah laughs ( _disgusting, what a monster_ ), flipping her braids over her shoulders as she walks away.

Kankri pushes harder against the locker. He calls out but then, oh that’s right, he almost forgot, he has no friends, who would help him? Still, he bangs against the locker until a few people stop to laugh, kick it, say if only whoever did this had the insight to tape his mouth shut. Kankri says nothing after that. He slides down, grateful he isn’t very big lest it’d be even more uncomfortably cramped in here, pulls his knees to his chest and shuts his eyes. He’s never been very good at blocking out their voices, why should this time be any different?

He feels the familiar sting of tears pricking at his eyes and he shuts them, burying his face in the crook of his arms. Despite the warmth of his sweater, he feels cold. The empty feeling is back in his heart.

* * *

Time passes slowly. The bell rang at some point, he’s sure. He’s missed all his classes. It’s still cold. So cold.

A shadow. Violet eyes through the slits in the locker. The squeaky sound of someone pulling open the door. Kankri tumbles out into strong, soft arms, and when he looks up he sees concerned violet eyes, a cigarette hanging from pale lips. _He looks dead_ , Kankri thinks, now that he finally sees the new boy up close. Those smiles before, were they fake?

“You were in there all day and no one let you out?” He says his w’s all funny. No, that’s offensive. He has a speech impediment. His words sound oddly smoothed, like someone carved into marble and made soft zigzags into the rock. Or like ripples in water.

“Why would anyone let out the boy everyone hates?”

“I don’t hate you.”

“You don’t know me.”

“Well, let’s change that, shall we?”

* * *

Cronus Ampora is very offensive. He smokes and hits on the girls and hits on the boys and belittles people who rejected him in a terrible attempt at making himself feel better than them. But he is also Kankri’s only friend. He never hits on Kankri. And he still looks dead behind the false bravado. He only looks alive when he cries, when he curls his fingers around Kankri’s and leans against him, when they huddle behind the bleachers and he gives Kankri his lunch when he has none and they talk for hours. He listens, and Kankri is so surprised, so grateful, even if not all the words register. He listens and that’s all Kankri needs. He feels less empty.

Sometimes he sounds as peaceful as a little stream, and other times he sounds like violent waves crashing against the shore. Particularly when he’s defending Kankri. He even defends him from Meenah, even though he’s strangely infatuated with her. Kankri doesn’t know what he sees in her, and after a particularly harsh rejection from her, Cronus admits that he doesn’t know either.

“She’s just pretty. Fierce.”

“She’s terrible. She locked me in that locker, you know.” Cronus does know because he’s been told many times before. “She’s also classist and extremely rude. She doesn’t care about other people aside from those in her clique. She’ll do anything for money, even though she’s practically swimming in it. Her family looks down on everyone lower than them, which is everyone in this whole town. And she,” he angrily stabs his straw into his juice box. He glares at the grass, at the person approaching their little section under the bleachers (the person hastily retreats), grits his teeth. “She,” she’s horrible terrible invasive she talks about Karkat like it’s no big deal like it’s no big deal he’s so sick and she could help him she could but she doesn’t she doesn’t care about anyone but herself in the end and _he hates her he wants her to burn because it’s her fault Karkat is the way he is he KNOWS it is but no one will believe him NO ONE_

The juice box is no longer in his hand. His vision is blurry and pale hands are holding his own firmly. That watery voice is flowing through his vicious thoughts and he can’t make them out. All he can do is thump his head against Cronus’s chest and weep. He feels fingers carding through his hair and Cronus’s chest rumbles with the words he can’t make out and the ball in his chest that has been building for months finally explodes and he screams, muffled by the cotton of Cronus’s shirt, says it all, all he’s ever wanted to say, and cries harder than he ever has.

* * *

The next time he’s aware of his surroundings, he’s in a dimly lit room. It smells faintly of tobacco and strongly of the ocean. The walls are painted purple (violet? lilac? it’s too dark to tell) and the ceiling is painted to resemble a dark ocean, the forms and tails of sea creatures peeking out between the waves, an unfortunate, yet majestic ship being plunged beneath the depths. The horizon is ominous with storm clouds, red lightning. It’s beautiful. Beautiful and sad.

Kankri’s head aches. There’s a glass of water on the side table and he just now notices the bed he’s laying on is the softest bed he’s ever been on. It has a canopy, one of those really nice old fashioned ones, which is also some shade of purple-blue, with the curtains pulled back. He slowly sits up, leaning over to take the glass with shaky hands. As his eyes adjust to the light, he sees posters adorning the walls (posters of _Grease_ , _The Outsiders_ , and various other 50’s and ocean themed works). It’s a big room, maybe about the size of his living room. Maybe bigger. How did he get here?

He smells tobacco, stronger this time. A light breeze. He looks to his left and sees french doors pulled open, a figure smoking on the balcony. He slips out of bed slowly, joining the figure. The person. Cronus.

Cronus has those dead eyes set towards their small town, the burning sun sinking into the earth. It hurts Kankri’s eyes so he just looks at Cronus, watches him smoke that cancer stick (why does he still do it? after all he’s told him about the dangers of smoking you’d think he’d have stopped by now). His gazes drifts down to Cronus’s bare arms (where’s his jacket? he always wears it. what’s happening today). Scarred arms. Little rows of raised scars, pink, bright red, pale pale white. A few look circular. His hands are shaking. The cigarette drops, falling onto the pavement so far down below. Kankri feels sick.

“I’m sorry about your cousin,” he whispers, voice . “I had no idea.” He lowers his head into the crook of his arms, grips the railing.

Kankri learns that day that he isn’t the only one with secrets.

* * *

They go to the hospital a few days later. Kankri’s cousin looks so much like him. He almost laughs at Cronus’s bewildered look, and he actually does laugh softly when Cronus leans over and whispers, _you sure he’s not your brother?_

Karkat is a child. All brown skin and freckles and red-copper-auburn eyes and delicate features just like his cousin. But he’s a lot smaller and sickly looking and his eyes have deeper bags than Kankri ever will and he’s hooked up to IVs and a heart monitor and he’s. He’s just so frail. He still has a few pounds on him, but someone can only gain so much weight eating hospital food. Kankri rubs at his eyes, trying to stop the tears from flowing like a neverending river.

He feels a hand on his shoulder. Cronus leans over him, watching Karkat with an unreadable expression. Karkat stares right back, tired eyes narrowing.

Finally, Cronus says, “what did Meenah do to you?”

Kankri tenses. Karkat’s eyes narrow more, to little slits, almost like cat eyes. “You won’t believe it. No one fucking believes it.”

“Oh, I’ll believe it. Tell me.”

Karkat grips the bedsheets tightly. Someone stirs in the next bed, but the curtain hides its occupant. “She took me out one night. Showed up by my window, all grinning and shit. Said to come, we’d be back ‘fore anyone noticed. I was feeling pretty okay and fucking rebellious ‘cause -- I -- I don’t know. Me and Kankri had this big fight right before and. Yeah. So I went with her. She took me to this really big house with really loud music that made it feel like there an earthquake. I was -- excited. Meenah’s cool -- was cool. She liked me even though we’re poor and she listened to me and sometimes got me things and went with me to get medication when dad and Kankri were busy. She was nice. So I was kinda happy we were there.”

He takes a breath, coughs a little. Kankri hands him the paper cup of water on the nightstand. “It seemed fun, even though the music hurt my head and my ears and I had to stay by the windows ‘cause I couldn’t breathe too good otherwise. Lots of people were smoking all sorts of shit, drinking too. Meenah she (coughcough) -- she gave me a cup of some kinda, juice. I thought. And told me to let loose, have some goddamn fun. So I tried to. I wanted to have fun like everyone else, I wanted her to think she could take me to places like this, with her friends and people who normally would’ve hated me. And even though I told her I wanted to stay by the window, later on she dragged me further into the house, past people who were,” he cringes, grimaces. “doing disgusting shit on the couches and in the corners, up the stairs and I tried to tell her it was getting hard to breathe but she said I could use my inhaler and I’d be fine. And I tried, but it didn’t help too much, and she brought me into this really smoky room and I was feeling really dizzy and kinda sick, and she said to sit on the bed. She opened a window for me, but then she just. I dunno. She lit some stuff and someone offered me another drink and someone said something about a game or? I don’t fucking remember. But she didn’t do anything when I said I wanted to go home, or at least outside for a bit. I don’t think she heard me. I dunno. And everyone was getting too close and everything was spinning and really loud but also muffled at the same time? It was scary. And then there was nothing for a while and the next thing I remember I was laying in a fucking bathtub, someone sitting on the end, looking at me with wide eyes. They were red where it’s supposed to be white. It was -- shit, it was Gamzee’s brother, yeah. He asked me if I was okay, ‘cause apparently I was breathing all funny and got all pale, and I didn’t know what to say. I just stared at him. He looked really scary and I dunno if it was ‘cause of what was in that drink, but I think I threw up. And everything hurt really bad and I cried like a fucking baby and then Meenah was there and pet my hair and rubbed my back and gave me another drink and I didn’t wanna take it! But she said it’d help! And she made me have it and next thing I knew, I was in the hospital. They said whatever I was given reacted really fucking badly with the medication I was already on and all that smoke fucked up my _already_ messed up lungs and I was lucky that Kankri had found me when he did.”

He’s crying. Big tears just rolling down his cheeks. Kankri is too, audibly, into his sleeves. Cronus is gripping Kankri’s shoulder too tightly.

“But no one believes it,” the kid manages. “I told Kankri and Kankri told dad. And Meenah came to visit me one time and she apologized, but they escorted her out. She’s not allowed to visit me anymore. But no one believes it. They all think she just took me out and I got fucked up all on my own. She won’t even tell the truth. Maybe she doesn’t even fucking remember. And they all tell Kankri and dad that it’s _their_ fault it even happened ‘cause they weren’t watching me or some stupid shit. But it was me. All me. I should’ve never gone out… I should’ve stayed home but I was a dumbfuck and now --!”

Kankri pulls Karkat to his chest, halting his words. They cry in each other’s arms and Kankri has to give Karkat his inhaler and Cronus just stands there. He distantly hears the curtain being pulled back, another kid’s voice murmuring something or another, no doubt in disbelief.

Cronus throws up in the trash can, tears pricking at his eyes.

Kankri and Karkat cry during the whole visit.

When it’s finally time to leave, Mr. Vantas the last to step out the room (he had come sometime, no one remembers), Cronus hands him a check.

“For the hospital bill.”

* * *

Cronus stops trying to pursue Meenah and Kankri couldn’t be happier (even though he still catches him watching her across the room, he honestly can’t tell what emotion is behind those dead eyes, or if it’s simply nothing). He stops trying to educate her, mainly because Cronus pulls him away everytime he tries to.

“He’s going to be okay,” he’s saying, leaning over the kitchen counter. They’re both in Kankri’s house. Mr. Vantas is sitting at the table, slowly sipping a cup of coffee. He doesn’t look up, probably feeling uncomfortable that a boy half his age is paying for his hefty hospital bill. But Kankri does.

“What?”

Cronus smiles, putting the pen down. He slides the check over, his signature smooth cursive, signed in violet ink. Kankri takes it, hands shaking just a bit. “He’s going to be okay. Maybe not today. Or tomorrow. Or next week or anytime soon, but one day. He’ll come home and she’ll never touch him again.”

There’s a lump in his throat. Please, god, he’s been crying so much lately, not again.

Mr. Vantas breaks first. He leaves the room, leaves Kankri to cry into Cronus’s arms once again.

* * *

They’re just kids, Kankri realizes one day during lunch. They shouldn’t have to deal with any of this.

“There’s a party tonight. Wanna come with me?” Cronus asks, out of the blue, holding an ice pack to his eye. Not even he can escape the bullies. His watery words just attract more of them.

Kankri narrows his eyes, lowering his juicebox. “I don’t go to parties.”

“I know.”

“And whoever’s party it is, I wasn’t invited.”

“I’m inviting you.”

“I refuse to go somewhere people will just degrade me further.” He takes a sip of his juice. It’s pineapple. “I don’t even like parties.”

“It won’t be so bad. It’s out of town. No one’ll know you.” Cronus lights a cigarette, the smoke puffing out of his mouth. The grass is littered with them. There’s a small pile where he’s been stubbing them out and tossing them.

“I didn’t think you liked parties.” Kankri rips off a piece of his sandwich and eats it slowly.

Cronus smiles, a distant look in his eyes. “It passes the time.”

* * *

They go on Cronus’s motorcycle. He named it Greased Lightning. Kankri still can’t believe it.

The place is average sized. Someone’s house. The music isn’t too loud and while he can smell people smoking, it isn’t overpowering (nothing like what Karkat explained). Cronus takes his hand and leads him up the stairs to the second floor. A few people wave to them. Others are making out in the corner. In the room Cronus takes him to, the bed is messy, three people sleeping, scantily clad. Kankri wrinkles his nose and actively avoids looking at them.

Cronus pushes open the window, letting in a cool night’s breeze in. Kankri smells rain coming. He notices Cronus smiling and he furrows his brows. Especially when he hands him a bottle of some liquor from the mini fridge.

“This is what you do to pass the time?” He sits down under the window, unscrewing the cap. It smells sweet.

Cronus laughs, sliding down the wall to sit next to him. He pulls out a cigarette but doesn’t light it, just rolls it in between his fingers. “When I’m not with you? Yeah. So, not so much anymore, but occasionally.”

Kankri takes a sip. It’s bittersweet and burns on the way down. Another sip helps. It’s good, in the odd sort of way alcohol is.

Distantly, he hears crickets and the low rumble of cars making their way through the streets and the soft music and the conversations like low hums throughout the house. Kankri isn’t sure how he feels. It’s his first party in years and yet, he never would have gone if Cronus hadn’t dragged him out. He realizes he does a lot of things he never would do with anyone but Cronus. Sitting like this, here in an unfamiliar house with unfamiliar people in the middle of the night? He never would have done this months ago. Years ago.

“Why did you bring me here?” He passes the bottle to Cronus. He looks at the cigarette in one hand and the bottle in the other like he doesn’t know what to do with either. Then he takes a sip of the liquor, tucking the cigarette behind his ear.

“‘cause I like spending time with you.”

“But _why_?”

Cronus looks at him like he’s just grown an extra head, like he just can’t understand what Kankri is asking, and Kankri grabs the bottle and takes a long sip, looking away. They’ve been friends for a while now and he still has no idea why Cronus even rescued him in the first place, or how he could possibly pay for the hospital bills like it’s nothing.

“Because I like _you_.”

Cronus’s eyes are wide and vividly violet, like the waves on a dark night. Intense and holding too many secrets, and yet, none at all. They don’t look even the slightest bit dead. Kankri doesn’t feel empty. Just confused. Lost. Like the waves in Cronus’s eyes are pulling him under and he has no chance of escape.

He doesn’t know why he’s crying.

* * *

Cronus tastes just how he smells. Tobacco and the ocean. He’s always cool to the touch too. Maybe that’s the second reason he always wears that jacket.

The jacket is off now. They’re in Cronus’s too big room in his too comfortable bed and Kankri doesn’t remember what happened to his sweater. Cronus is chuckling at his pants and Kankri pushes himself up and shuts him up with another kiss.

They’re both terribly inexperienced and don’t know what they’re doing, but it’s okay. Because Kankri feels _full_ , feels so warm, like someone took all the pieces of him and carefully, lovingly pieced him back together. He wonders if Cronus feels the same way.

* * *

“We’re just kids,” Kankri says one day. They’re in the waiting room of the hospital. Mr. Vantas is asleep. It’s late into the night. “we shouldn’t have to deal with any of this.”

Cronus tilts his head, tired eyes watching him, an unlit cigarette hanging from his lips. “Hm?”

“ _This_ ,” he gestures around him, to the hospital, to their situation. Every terrible situation they’ve ever been thrown into. His voice is thick with held back tears. “we shouldn’t have to deal with this. We’re just kids. We may not be the best of people, but we don’t deserve this. It seems as if the worst people get the best handed to them on a silver platter and everyone else gets beaten down relentlessly. When will it be our chance to get a break? Why do we have to suffer when _they (she)_ get to reap all the benefits?”

Cronus watches him for a long time. Kankri shuts his eyes tightly, tears rolling down his cheeks. Cronus stands, grabbing Kankri’s shoulder, pulling him up, and leads him past the other morose families, past the blond kid in the wheelchair, handheld console in his hands to keep him awake. He looks up at them, aviators atop his head, red eyes puffy from crying. Cronus pats his shoulder, flashing him a weary grin before he pulls Kankri out of the waiting room, out of the hospital where a scattered few are smoking, laying on benches, or just sitting in their cars. Cronus lights his cigarette and leans against the railing, tilting his head back to look up at the starless sky. Kankri watches him, wiping his eyes. Sniffling. He feels pathetic. Why does he have to be so emotional? It started after he met Cronus.

A strong arm around his shoulders. Cronus pulls him close, smoke puffing out of his mouth. Kankri leans against Cronus and joins the crying families, weeping for his cousin’s surgery. For success. Please, god, let the surgery be successful please please he’s just a child he has so much to live for and he can’t lose him no he can’t ever lose him please --

Cronus presses his lips against Kankri’s cheek, his cigarette between his fingers, holding it away. “Shhh,” he hushes. “our time will come. Some day. You just have to keep holding out until then.”

Kankri wonders if  Cronus believes his own words or if he’s just saying it to comfort him. He can’t help asking in between broken cries, “do you really believe that?”

“‘course. I held out even though I didn’t want to. Even though sometimes I still don’t want to. Then the world blessed me with you. So yeah, good things do happen. I think so, anyway.”

Kankri stares at him for so long it feels as if the world has stopped and he’s just floating away. But then Cronus squeezes him close and kisses his cheek again and he comes down to earth, tears flowing harder. How is it possible to cry so much? He feels like he’s going to fall to the ground, the only thing keeping him up being Cronus’s strong arms.

He cries until Mr. Vantas comes out, wiping away his own tears, looking more relieved than ever, to tell them that the surgery was a success.

* * *

Karkat is a slow healer, but he’s awake and everything went well so that’s all Kankri cares about. He won’t be home for a while but he _will_ be home eventually. He tells Karkat this one afternoon. Cronus is dozing off on a chair and the occupant of the next bed is throwing bits of paper at him.

“I don’t even remember what my room looks like,” Karkat says, voice raspier than usual, and coughs a bit. Kankri squeezes his hand gently, a smile slowly forming on his face. “or what it smelled like.”

“It’s just how you left it. Everything’s all over the place. Your beanbag chair in the corner, blankets everywhere, messy bed, desk against the wall near the window, posters all over the walls, lava lamp on the night stand. Sound familiar?”

Karkat smiles a little too, nodding. “What’s it smell like? Everything smells like hospital all the time.”

“Faintly of cherries. Mostly fresh laundry.”

Karkat smiles more. It reaches his eyes for the first time in what feels like forever and Kankri very gently holds his small cousin close. He’s so grateful.

* * *

They’re in Cronus’s room again. His bathroom, to be exact. In the tub. Kankri had insisted he at least keep his boxers on. Cronus laughed. He’s still laughing, softly, into Kankri’s fluffy dark brown hair. Kankri wonders how Cronus could be so shameless, but then he quickly dismisses the idea. That’s rude. He occupies himself by brushing his fingers over Cronus’s scars. Only a few are recent. Hopefully one day none of them will be.

“He should be coming home soon.”

“Oh yeah?” Cronus rests his cheek atop Kankri’s head.

“Mm,” he hums softly, a gentle smile on his face despite the fact that he’s holding his dearest’s scarred arms. He’s sure he can get some scar cream for these. “you were right.”

“‘course I was.” A pause. “‘bout what, exactly?”

“Good things do happens. Just sometimes certain people have to wait longer than others.” He looks up at Cronus. Those stormy eyes are full of adoration and life. Kankri feels full too, empty no longer.

**Author's Note:**

> Cronus, Kankri, Meenah and Kurloz are 16. Karkat and Dave are 10. Signless is 34.
> 
> Karkat was given a cup of liquor mixed with drugs at the party, that was the game he heard being mentioned. Where people are given cups of alcohol and one is filled with drugs. The person who gets that one is the 'winner'. And Meenah gave him alcohol twice, mainly because she thought it'd relax him/help him feel better. It reacted really badly with his medication (he's a sickly child) and he started internally bleeding. She's especially bad in this and I'm not really sorry. I do like Meenah, but she isn't a good person. She knows exactly what to say to get under someone's skin. She does care for Karkat, though. In her own way.
> 
> And yes, Dave was Karkat's roommate. He's there for chronic back pain/back surgery.


End file.
